Guinness (2/1996)

Guinness "Bicycle", "Old Man" + "Men & Women" [00:50]#
"Not everything in black and white makes sense," is the theme of this black and white campaign for Guinness. "Bicycle" confronts us with the old feminist motto, "Woman needs man like a fish needs a bicycle." We see scenes from a world in which men are neither present nor missed, followed by a long camera pan through an empty maternity ward. Providing the commercial with an ultimately ambiguous message is a fish cycling by on his bike. The second spot in the series shows a very old man in his home, looking through his photo album and talking to his budgie. A super is inserted with Pete Townshend's unfulfilled wish, "Hope I die before I get old." The old man then gets dressed for what turns out to be his wedding to a much younger woman. The third, and possibly most brilliant, spot in this series was never aired since the client apparently got cold feet. To the strains of Tammy Wynette's "Stand By Your Man," we see a typical male chauvinist who drops his clothes wherever he takes them off, leaves wet towels lying all over the place and expects his mate to clean up after him. In between a super: "I don't think men and women are meant to live together. They are totally different animals," a quote by former sexpot Diana Dors. As it turns out in the final frames of the spot, however, the mate in this case is another man.